With Manchester City’s throat exposed in this peculiar season, there were long periods on Sunday when Liverpool seemed intent on tripping themselves up instead of putting their boot where it was needed. Naturally, it was Mo Salah who brought sense to such madness.
Where would they be without him? It is a question that has been given urgency by the dwindling time on his contract, but when his answers are so convincing, you really do wonder what has kept the club’s decision-makers from coughing up.
Salah’s contribution here was definitive, both as a means of carrying Liverpool to an eight-point cushion at the top of the table and also for steering them away an almighty embarrassment.
Southampton is no place to expect a life-and-death tussle in this division, but after 56 minutes the bottom club led the one at the top.
More worryingly, Russell Martin’s side hadn’t even built such an improbable situation on great football – they were bold, brave, taking all those risks they favour at the back, but they were getting away with countless mistakes because Liverpool were lost to their own sluggishness. Possibly their own complacency, too.
And so the advantage afforded by Dominik Szoboszlai in the first half wilted badly, first through Adam Armstrong’s rebound after his penalty had been saved, and then when Mateus Fernandes put them in front. Liverpool errors were not hard to find, nor was a route to their area, which is saying something – Southampton had only seven goals to their name before this fixture and seem certainties for relegation.
Mohamed Salah came to the rescue for Liverpool, converting a crucial penalty in the 82nd minute to clinch a vital victory
Dominik Szoboszlai opened the scoring to put Liverpool ahead after an error by the Saints
Adam Armstrong levelled the contest as he followed up his own missed penalty just before half-time
But then Salah woke up. First, he cushioned a volley past Alex McCarthy, and goodness know if it was a heavy touch or a deliberate finish, though by now, we must surely give him the benefit of the doubt.
Then came the penalty that offered Liverpool a way out of the hole. With Salah’s strike from the spot buried, he whipped his shirt off, and you’d hope Liverpool’s accountants are just as quick in scribbling the number he needs. Because his digits deserve it – 12 goals and 10 assists in 18 games across all competitions this season is obscene, and only the brainless would attach greater weight to his age of 32.
In the bigger picture, it is necessary to marvel once more at how well Arne Slot has done in what seemed an impossible task to replace Jurgen Klopp. Granted, his early fixtures have been kind, and forthcoming engagements with Real Madrid and City will tell us more, but this has been a magnificent inversion of expectations.
And yet Liverpool’s latest win was laced with the thought that it was harder than it needed to be, because Southampton, for all of Martin’s aesthetic intentions, committed so many errors it could have been a hiding.
Within two minutes, Kyle Walker-Peters had been lumbered with possession on the edge of his own area and was immediately surrounded before passing directly into touch. It became the most predictable of patterns, with the only saving grace that Liverpool lacked the speed of thought to capitalise.
We should spare Szoboszlai from that bracket. He has had a somewhat turbulent season already, losing his starting spot for a time prior to the international break, but Slot brought him in for Alexis MacAllister and he excelled on his brief to disrupt.
He generated one decent chance for himself through his smothering of Fernandes on the edge of the area, before then benefiting more directly from another Southampton misadventure on the half hour mark, when he put Liverpool ahead.
It was the kind of goal that raises so many questions about Martin’s style, and indeed future, because Southampton made life awfully complicated by rotating the ball between Alex McCarthy, Fernandes and Flynn Downes in their own area before the latter mishit a clearance under pressure. It was controlled up by Szoboszlai 20 yards out and his curled finish around McCarthy was delightful.
Mateus Fernandes surprised the visitors, putting Southampton ahead in the 56th minute
Salah’s touch from a ball over the top bypassed goalkeeper Alex McCarthy for their second
For Liverpool, those alpha moments were too few and far between. Salah was initially getting little joy out of an out-of-position Ryan Fraser, Darwin Nunez was peripheral, and Ryan Gravenberch was having one of those rare games where the tempo was out of his control.
For a good while, there was no Southampton threat to inspire thoughts of what it might mean. And then came the sucker punch of a penalty for 1-1. Virgil van Dijk will take some blame for conceding possession to start the attack, and more so Robertson, who clattered Tyler Dibling when he came across to cover. Armstrong buried the rebound after his initial strike was saved by Caoimhin Kelleher.
Liverpool were still in a funk when they went behind to a counter-move 10 minutes after the restart. Tyler Dibling was the most incisive component by raking a ball from right to left to Armstrong, whose loose touch ought to have given Nunez ample time to catch up with Fernandes, who had charged up the middle. Instead Fernandes was left free to gather the pass and finish for 2-1.
Slot responded with two changes, bringing on Mac Allister and Luis Diaz, and their pressure increased, culminating in Salah’s equaliser. McCarthy, otherwise superb in saving from Cody Gakpo, Szoboszlai and later Diaz, got his angles wrong as charged from his line in reaction to a ball over the top from Gravenberch and Salah’s touch did the rest.
A Yuki Sugawara handball for a penalty in the 83rd minute allowed Salah the opportunity to ram home his argument for a new deal even more powerfully. He took his chance, as he always does. Liverpool must now avoid being careless with what they have in their own hands.
